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Thorne was, by no real conscious attempt, getting attention that he really didn't think he deserved and wasn't all to do with his personality, but rather his voice.

The ex-captain had come to the bar completely oblivious to the fact that it was karaoke night. If there was a poster boy for "right place, wrong time", it would probably be him looking like a deer in headlights. All he'd wanted was a drink and maybe a conversation or two that hinged on nothing but his looks, the glaring fact that he was alone.

Something superficial and easy.

But then it was karaoke night, and it wasn't his choice before someone shoved him on stage the first time, and his rendition of "Crazy in Love" (ala Snow Patrol, jesus christ) somehow caused a riot. From then on, it was a dog pit and he was the piece of ******** meat being fought over. He'd managed to let a line of half-drunk singers go while avoiding an encore, hiding out in the back corner and accepting whatever free drink he was being offered at the time.

But he was pretty sure his time was up.

"Look," one of the waitresses told him as she dumped another free shot on his table, "I'm not saying that you need to do something to please the masses before a mob forms right here and right now, but if you don't, I will hog-tie you and send you up there in ropes to sing."

Thorne eyed her, half appreciating her word choice and half terrified of her threat. "That's not very good hospitality."

"This is a bar, sweet thing. Hospitality isn't the game." She pointed her finger to the empty stage. "Now. Up. Up, up!"

"What about a song - "

"Already chosen!" She shoved him from his seat bodily, and the sea of people watching parted for him. "Let's have some fun!"

Thorne wasn't aware that he was on stage again until the music started, and what the <********> - he couldn't well run off now, tail between his legs. He was just lucky that the song was something he knew - something he'd sung before, over and over again in fact, in the confines of his apartment when the inspiration ran out or his nerves frayed too much.

He closed his eyes and tried not to think too much on the crowd staring at him. And then -

"All you sinners stand up, sing hallelujah - " The adrenaline, the giddiness, the complete lightness of being unrecognizable, anonymous and liked for nothing but his voice, ran through Thorne like a current, and he grinned as he moved up against the microphone, every bit the actor that he'd once been when he'd been so comfortable in the presence of others, burning with hunger and need. His entire body moved to the beat, the rhythm thrumming through him. The crowd, appreciative, roared to life and he grinned out at them, nothing but raw energy and adrenaline. Happy for once to please.

"Show praise with your body, stand up, sing hallelujah! And if you can't stop shaking, lean back, let it move right through ya, say your prayers, say your prayers, say your prayers - "

Thorne was drunk on the adrenaline. He reveled in the roar of the crowd, the way they screamed the words back at him sometimes, the way their hands went up and the whoops and hollers filled the air. He was grinning, ear to ear, devious and consumed. He'd pulled the microphone from its stand to move closer to the crowd, his entire body moving to the beat, taken away by the lyrics.

His eyes drifted back to the crowd as the instrumental break burned to an end, and his eyes reached the bar.

For a moment, he wasn't sure he was seeing right. For a moment, it was a serious consideration that this was some hallucination. A dream.

But no.

This was reality, from the sweat beading at the nape of his neck to the crowds persistent roar to Lucas staring at him from the bar, his expression like a kid in a candy shop.

Over what? Over who? Thorne's gut burned with a new adrenaline, not at all to do with the music, and he opened his mouth to sing without breaking eye contact, the words spilling from his lips.

"No one wants you when you have no heart and, I'm sitting pretty in my brand new scars. You'll never know if you don't try again so let's try, let's try, let's try."

Thorne's lips pressed into a grin and he leaped from the stage, earning a surprised whoop and scream from the crowd. He moved with languid grace through them, cutting the crowd in two as they twisted to make way. Make way. The lyrics spilled, hot and hotter and just like the wicked expression on his face.

And then he moved to the bar, leaping up onto the elevated platform it had been built on and leaning over Lucas, a grin split across his face. All around him were hollers and shouts and cheers, but his eyes stayed on the man. Like a fixed point around which he could orbit.

"Say your prayers," he sang as the song came to a close, shoulders rolled back, head tilted to the side, every ******** tattoo and scar on display, "say your prayers, say your prayers."

The music faded and cheers of the crowd nearly threatened to swallow them both whole. Thorne bent his head, watching, waiting, for a long moment, and then he said -

"If I'd known you were here, I would have sung you something better. Something to serenade you with."

It was so loud. So loud, and yet - all he could hear was Lucas. His expression radiated surprise and warmth and devious pleasure. He looked like he'd been starving, and Lucas was a sight to drink in for ages. The world could have ended around them and Thorne might not have noticed.

And maybe that wasn't such a bad thing.

He laughed at the first remark and cocked his head to the side, eyes wild-bright and full of feverish delight, his chest still heaving from the exertion of the song, of the dance, of the heat that razed the room to the ground and made everyone sweat coated, love-sick.

"Partners?" The word came from his lips curiously, but his eyes half-lidded. "Lucas, there is literally one person in this entire bar that I would want to serenade right now, the rest of them be damned." He paused and closed his eyes with another laugh. "And anyways," he added, his voice husky and rough from singing, "I love the element of surprise. And what was waiting on the other end."

He leaned into the touch, an animal gesture in response. He dragged his lips against Lucas's pulse, teeth scraping the skin there for a moment in tease before his gaze drifted back to the other.

"Didn't expect to find you in a dive like this," he hummed, his throat vibrating with the sound, "for once it seems we're meeting like normal people do. So, if we're playing by those rules, you're at least obliged to let me buy you a drink."

His eyes flared with mirth, with some devious intent and mischief uncovered after all this time by the adrenaline, the exhilaration of this place, this person, this crazy, crazy meeting of chance.

"At least as a start."

Thorne laughed again, this time a flash of embarrassed glee showing in his eyes. He was wild, down to his bones. But a catch? His eyes flicked to Lucas, and he thought about biting down on every word from his throat, but what was the point? Here, now, what was the point of any of it? "You think you were the one being seduced?" He commented, his grin flashing, "I saw you and thought '********, he's hot.' I thought I was going to die. Literally, and metaphorically. And it would have been a good death." He rumbled, a thick sound of pleasure and amusement. "I'm not wasting anything. Especially not on you."

At the mention of a drink, Thorne huffed, but acquiesced, privately plotting to take over Lucas's tab by the end of the night. Never let it be said that he couldn't be sneaky. And anyways, he'd once had a good habit of making bartenders like him.

"A shot - whatever's good and cheap," he said to the bartender, and got a nod of approval, a snort of amusement.

His eyes lowered as the contact dropped, and there was a shift of movement that as though he might reclaim it. But not yet, not yet. Instead he stepped closer, so that their knees brushed and he could speak in a way that allowed Lucas to hear without straining quite as much. "What can I say, I have performance anxiety," he rumbled with a laugh, tilting his head down so that they were a little closer.

At the mention of Aleksy though, something like surprise and embarrassment and outrage flashed across his face. "Jesus christ," Thorne said, throwing his head back with a groan, "I'm going to kill him." That wasn't true. Aleksy was strange and eccentric and the fact that he talked to Thorne at 3AM and convinced him to buy cupcake tiers from Pier 1 made him a strange ally in his life.

But why the hell couldn't he keep his mouth shut? For that matter, when had Lucas even met Aleksy? Did they know each other? Oh god - were they friends?

Thorne covered his face with his hands and a low noise of embarrassment flooded from him.

After a good thirty seconds he sighed and pushed his hands up into his hair, rifling it in embarrassment. And then he glanced down, regained his composure, and said, "he's - a crazy a** kid with a lot of flowers. And he convinces me to buy things I really don't need, and the only reason he knows is because for some reason he entertained me at 3AM when I couldn't sleep and I..." He smiled in embarrassment, "I was freaking out because I like you and I was nearly positive sleeping with you might have destroyed any chance I had at - this. Any of this. You. Not just your body. You."

He shook his head. And then his grin turned slow and sly and devious and he placed his hands on the bar behind Lucas and leaned over him, eyes roving and curious. "But what a conquest indeed," he added, tilting his head to the side, "for once, luck was on my side."

Thorne laughed, tilting his head to the side, wild eyes flashing in the half-light of the dive bar. He was burning, every part of him, with that nameless thing that had shifted awake inside of him since their second - first - meeting. "Should I apologize?" He teased. "Because I won't. Apparently I'm shameless as well as selfish." He shrugged, every movement charged and electric. "And you really don't see what you do to others, do you?" The unspoken second half of the sentence crackled in the air between them: You don't see what you do to me. He let his canine rub against his lip in a soft n** before saying, "Have you seen some of our neighbors? There's a reason I crawl through my window as a habit."

Thorne watched as his words sank into Lucas's head. It was less a car crash of expressions and more a dawning realization, and he wondered just how badly he'd ******** up in the moment of heat and excitement. He hadn't really pawed at the memory of only a few minutes ago yet - how his entire body had thrummed with a new sort of adrenaline as soon as he'd seen the other man in the crowd. How he'd let the rest of the world drop away, the words half-remembered in his throat, drowned in the desire to be closer. Closer.

"There's more than enough for me," Thorne said, his voice low and raw and hungry, "But there's - there's you. And that's what I keep coming back to. You really don't see what you are? Hell, Lucas. I'm damned lucky you ever looked my way. And sometimes I'm sure it's only because everyone in our building was ********." He smiled, his grin on the verge of embarrassed, charged and electric with sudden honesty. He might have bitten down the words in another situation. Had they been in the apartments, he might have hidden as best he could.

But no. There was no point in hiding. They'd spoken in a language completely bereft of words the first night. What point was there in biting down on words now when neither of them had been shameful in the dark, barely past names?

So what if Lucas rejected him? It would hurt like hell, but at least Thorne wouldn't have to regret his actions in the aftermath.

He shuddered when Lucas turned and leaned back against him. It was a challenge to take the shot - a professional knock-back after which he smiled, fanged and devious, at the bartender - before refocusing his attention on the other man. He leaned forward, pressing his own body against Lucas's back. The heat threatened to overthrow everything sane in his mind, his arms loosely resting over Lucas's shoulders from where he'd reached to steal a drink.

Sighing, he bent his head, pressing his forehead to the crook between Lucas's shoulder and neck.

"Come on," he said, lifting his head enough so that his mouth ghosted Lucas's ears. "Let's pretend. For a night, let's pretend that we could - could do anything. Be anything."

Be normal. Be friends. Be more.

Because if they'd met - if they'd met normally, like this, in a dive bar, maybe things would have been different. And Thorne wanted to give Lucas something better than their last encounter. Something - something to hold onto. If that was what he wanted.

Thorne laughed. "I don't know," he said softly, desperately, "I don't know. Shouldn't I be the one asking you that?"

The shot had warmed his body, made it burn even more. He could feel the slick slide of heat against the small of his back, every part of him where he connected with Lucas. But there was a different warmth hungry in his bones, and he thought if he just brushed it, just touched the surface of it, he'd be consumed.

He wondered if he'd ever felt this way before in his life. But if he had, if this had ever happened, surely he would be better at handling himself. All he could do was cling - cling to the normality, the surrealism of this entire encounter. Press his hopes and wants and desperation into words. In another time, another place, another life, maybe Lucas and him had met normally. Maybe - maybe -

Oh, but maybes didn't matter. Not here. Not now.

"I'm glad you stopped to look," Thorne rumbled with laughter, his entire body vibrating from the sound, "I wouldn't have moved. I was too busy staring. I was convinced for the longest time I lived next to a senile woman with enough steel in her nerves to survive the apocalypse. Guess how surprised I was."

He chanced looking up at Lucas, the smile still playing on his lips, a ghost. His eyes considered. He drank in the sight. He let Lucas guide the conversation, because he felt rubbed raw from a different method of confession tonight, and if he didn't hear the man speak, he was sure he would go crazy. His eyes, wild-bright in the chaos and din of the bar, were focused on Lucas as though they were alone. As though there were no one else in the room, in the world, but them.

"You really think I was here trying to find a boyfriend? Please, Lucas," Thorne laughed, his voice cracking, "But I was lucky. At least you were here to change my mind." He paused, looking at the other, lifting himself just enough that they could view one another without bending into uncomfortable positions.

"We'd be..." Thorne started, soft and slow, his eyes storming and hungry and wild. He wondered and wondered over it, the way he wondered over all of the things he couldn't have. He wondered over what he wanted, what made that unnamed thing in his chest, in his gut, so painful to press on whenever Lucas was near.

"We'd be important," he settled on finally, "We'd be - something. Something more. We wouldn't just be... this - this chance meeting in the dark." He shrugged and laughed and lowered his head. "I would ask you to dance, and you'd say yes. I'd take you to dinner. I'd take you out on the town. I'd make you hold my cat. You'd let me in through the front door, and we'd - "

Oh and it hurt, it hurt, it hurt, to speak about dreams and worlds that didn't exist. It hurt.

"We'd be alright. We'd be good." He smiled at Lucas, an expression between honesty and that overwhelming happiness, so big and large that it almost felt sad. "I'd be good for you."

So ask me to dance.

Was it that easy? Was it as simple, as candid, as being lost in a single night? Thorne looked at Lucas, and his expression twisted with warmth, with some concept of confusion and happiness - because how had he stumbled into this? And why did it feel so <******** fragile? His hands shook at his sides. He wanted to hold onto this, onto Lucas. He wanted to - to make things right, and brilliant, and beautiful for the other man, the way they were in paintings.

He wanted to remember that he could do more with his body than break things. And god - god, he wanted to try. With Lucas, he was willing to try.

His breath blew from his lips, a soft noise swallowed by the din around them. Thankfully the karaoke set on stage was singing something slower, and their voices pitched at times, but were for the most part considerably worthy of respect. The crowd around them surged, anonymous, burning the air with heat and want and love-sickness. Everyone had their arms around someone. Everyone was looking for a hand to hold.

Thorne lifted his hand, touching his knuckles to Lucas's cheek. How could the man every downplay himself? Didn't he see what he was? His touch slid to the hummingbird heartbeat pulsing at Lucas's neck and his eyes lowered, mouth working, heart in atrophy.

"Lucas," Thorne said, and then - "Dance with me."

He offered his hands, pressing them to both of Lucas's. And then tentatively, he took a step back. And another. Guiding them both towards the anonymity of the crowd and the music and the world where maybe they could be something, if the other wanted. Because hope was a dangerous thing -

But maybe he could learn to like it.